Am I not Human?
by NeonZangetsu
Summary: He'll protect them. Always. Even if his world is sundered, if he becomes the very thing he hates, he will protect. Kurosaki Ichigo always protected his friends, but with his hollow spiraling out of control, things get...interesting. IchigoxHarem. VOTE!
1. Chapter 1

Cold fury burned the world white as the zanpakuto snapped.

_'No!'_

Dumbfounded, Kuchiki Rukia looked to the shattered zanpakutou that had once been Sode no Shirayuki, the beautiful blade now ending in a ragged tear just above the base of the hilt. Sorrow arched up her spine, her sorrow, and that of the sword she'd wielded.

_'No..._

The ground trembled for a second time as her adversary drew itself up befor her and blotted out the sun.

"Too bad, shinigami!" The reverberation shook the earth at her feet, and the Kuchikia trembled. "Looks like that piddly zanpakutou of yours can't stand up to me..._after all."_

Struggling to comprehend the broken blade, her gaze returned to the one who'd done the breaking to begin with. She had to peer through the shadow he cast; that deep and impenetrable shroud of scorn and derision serving only to blind her vision as she stared up up up, into the sun; steeling herself against what awaited her there.

"Now die, scum!"

The massive Arrancar was suddenly in front of Rukia, engulfing her entire field of vision as his caterpillar-like body eclipsed the artificial sunlight above them. His mouth ripped open, exposing a massive cavern of teeth and tongue and wet flesh. With as much of a smirk as his gaping maw would allow, a ball of crimson began to form, taking aim at the stunned Shinigami below him. Rukia blinked, eyes flying wide and disbelieving as he rworld was consumed in the bitter red haze.

She had time for only one thought.

_'It can't end like this-_

The wave of red energy slammed into her body, tearing away at her petite flesh. Her shihakusho smoldered at the sleeves and shoulders; the upper half of the black garment disintegrating as she fell to the sand below. She struck the ground with a painful _thud_, her head kissing an iron boulder and spraying hideous black specks across her vision. Numerous burns marred what little remained of her garb, leaving Kuchiki Rukia in a crippled heap amongst the arid sands of Hueco Muendo.

Her leg wrenched painfully when she tried to stand,

Rukia cursed her carelessness as Yammy began to squeeze with both hands. She should have stayed more alert; she'd already witnessed his indefatigable speed before. Her mind quickly became hazy as she felt one of her ribs splinter within her chest as the vice-grip like fist tightened upon her.

_Damnit._

"_Tch_," Yammy said as he peered down at his cpative, his huge hand grasping Rukia. "That make three, then."

He scooped her limp body up in his hand and glanced over it for a moment, admiring how such a small Shinigami could give him so much trouble. While it felt good to finally crush something, this woman who lay limp in his palm was even weaker than those other two he'd just killed. Damn, but he was still pissed that she had caused him to—

_"Soren Soukatsui!"_

Yammy blinked, wondering why it was that the snarling wave of azure and sapphire had just smacked into his face.

"That hurt!" He whined, scrubbing at his unamarred jawline. "That really hurt! In fact, that hurt so much...

Her vision was already fading around the edges, a dark blanket encroaching inwards from her peripheral sights. She heard a pop_–probably her shoulder tearing from the socket–_but she could hardly feel anything. Her head was spinning. The only thing he could see was Yammy's enormous grin before her face. Time ground to a halt as he cocked a fist back; the arm that held her prepared to hurl Rukia Kuchiki to her death leagues below the bitterly bright afternoon sky...

...and the words never came.

"What the _fuck_?"

A massive wave of dark _reiatsu _suddenly blanketed them, the spiritual energy flooding the underside of the dome with an oppressive and painful weight. Rukia heard the Cero Espada gasp in surprise before she noticed that her own breath had been squeezed from her lungs. Her heart threatened to buckle under the pressure as it took a violent jump and increased slightly; battering at the edges of her vision and turning them hazy and dark as her body threatened to black out again.

"What... the... fuck?" Yammy choked again, his grin inexplicasbly slackening for a moment. "Who...

Rukia offered only a silent sob as the spiritual pressure overwhelmed him.

_"This...this is...!'_

The thick mantle of _reiatsu _blanketed her. It felt heavy and angry and painful. She couldn't recognize who it belonged to, and inexplicably, she quivered. From the corner of her peripheals, the blackish red blur of some titanic swathe snarled into existence. With the infamous snap-hiss for which it had become so well known, the _Getsuga_ barreled into its target. The furious flames fanning out over its target and consuming flesh and bone in an instant; eliciting a mind-numbing scream from its recipient.

_"WHAAAAAAT THE FUUUUUUCK!" _Yammy screamed, bellowing beligerently against the sudden spurt of gore; the abrupt loss of balance serving as a bitter reminder that he'd just lost a limb. Without so much as a sliver of remorse, the blade came crashing down again, and took off another leg; slicing through hierro as if it were butter. of three of his legs on either side. "You...YOU THIRD RATE COPPER PLATED FUCKER!"

Rukia's world spun and tunneled, leaving her reeling as the massive espada came about, searching for the one who'd peppered him with the scalding shot of dark and flame. Unfortunately, his haste earned him another dark tinged blast; this _second_ explosion erupting into and across his open mouth. "That hurt!" Roaring, he twisted around, stomping upon the ground with his man legs in a vain attempt to quash whomever was attack him.

A blackened hiss greeted his attempt.

Rukia's ears went deaf and Yammy's eyes went wide as his right arm_-and by default the bonecrushing hand-_was severed from his body, the limb now falling away from him in a flash. Severed just above the elbow, the tanned fingers were wriggling slightly as the nerve endings within them struggled to receive signal from his brain once more, plummeting to the desert sea below. Rukia wrested herself free of his slackened grip an instant before impact, and the sheer air pressure of the fall rendered her impotent; frozen as she hurtled toward her doom...

Only to be violently snatched from the jaws of death.

Rukia blinked, wondering why the ground was receding from her vision. There was an arm clamped round her waist; the muscular forearm curled around her supple curves and petite frame with a great and infinite the arm had already curled around her waist. escaping from that incidentally freeing their captive before impact. Gulping down a fresh breath of air, Kuchiki Rukia twisted herself around and sought the face of her saviour from the skies; wondering who it was, who could have possibly_-effortlessly-_severed the espada's arm without even a glimmer of effort on their part.

The sun hid his face.

Thunder and lightning danced through the false and grief stricken afternoon sky as he descended to the battlefield. He was both terrible and handsome to behold. Death and suffering followed him as his stewards. His reiatsu drew a third of the armies sent against him to hell and those that remained were nothing more than a great feast for vultures. He was the one for whom darkness parted and became created; he holds the soul of the enemy of all living things...

He was death incarnate.

Rukia detected the familair clanking of the hilted chain as Yammy groped on blindly. His opponent forgotten, the espada lunged forward, his left arm stretched out in an attempt to reclaim the fallen limb that had been stolen from him once again.

Rukia blinked as she was rudely deposited on her ass.

"Nani...?"

Kurosaki Ichigo buzzed into view, his body blocking the giant arrancar, his eyes glaring out coldly from behind the frightening grin of his Vizard mask. With a hiss, he swung his zanpakuto backwards, a black _Getsuga _rocketing out from the tip of his sword and incinerating the Espada's arm within the dark energy. Rukia yelped as the ensuing detonation threw her out into space; her body flailing wildly as she spun head over heels and tumbled helplessly against the unyielding soil.

That was what was _supposed_ to happen.

She did not slam into the sand. Instead, she thumped against a warm chest. Strong arms shielded her from harm, the steady _thump-thump _of a heartbeat drowning her thoughts. She _cringed,_ her lips puckering against the pain; against the bitter tang of truth. This wasn't a hollow. A hollow could not have a heartbeat, that was true for all hollow and arrancar alike, wasn't it?

"BASTARD!" Yammy roared, flopping on the ground like a fish out of water; writhing in pain as the bloodied black blade receded. Another red tinged blast momentarily silenced his protest, and then the world inverted and Rukia found herself staring up at her saviour as they touched down upon one remaining salt pillars dotting the desert.

_**...protect."**_

Orange locks whipped wildly in the ensuing gale, fanning out behind a bare back and battered body. She stared at him and she was lost. Kuchiki Rukia was stricken mute; deaf and dumb as a burbling hiss exploded from behind that chalk white facade and trickled across the divide between the two of them.

"I...Ichigo?"

The hybrid whirled and affixed her with a baleful glare.

_**...protect."**_

Rukia almost flinched save for that word.

_'Protect?'_

Suddenly the crushing feeling ceased to exist, leaving the petite Kuchiki to catch her breath in peace as she was dropped. Rukia looked up at him with a shaken expression, her eyes slightly wider than normal as they sought his; those murderous golden-black orbs of killer intent finding her overlage orbs in an instant and riveting her where she stood. Peering down at her, she thought she recognized the tiniest gleam of recognition within those blackened slits of horned porcelain.

_Maybe._

"Ichigo." She repeated, reclaiming the old firmness in her voice. "Ichigo, is that you?" Her voice cracked as he set her down, his arms trembling from the effort required to complete the motion. A tiny sound of confusion escaped the mask as he gawked down at the one who had shrieked at him with such vehemence.

_**"Rukia."**_ Eeerily, the entity rumbled this reply, _**"I will...protect you."**_

She gawped up at him and he stared down at her as though she were but a mote of dust in the wind.

"...I-I don't need you to protect me." Rukia cursed her crass behavior; because he didn't answer, he only stared. She burned beneath the mask; those dreadful white horns pointed toward her in silent _accusation_ and judgement. She said nothing as the ambient sounds of battle faded to static in her mind. She was speechless, white static making her words sound empty; distant even, as she seethed silently, her jaw clenching against the insult that his silence hurled at her and perpetuated.

"Ichigo," she called out once more, but her voice was much softer than before. "Ichigo...can you hear me?"

He took his hand from her shoulder, and then another, smaller voice consumed her world.

_**"I WILL protect you, Rukia." **_He repeated._** "Because I'm tired of watching my friends die."**_

She stopped cold at the pleading tones in his words. Her head turned slowly as his dark eyes drifted back to her, those golden dark orbs filled with an emptiness that hadn't existed before his battle. It was disconcerting, to hear him say such things. Just as it was to see him attack without hesitation. _What happened up there, Ichigo?_ That wasn't reluctance in his eyes. Nor could it be called hesitation. A hollow enormity swelled within her gut as he touched a hand to the mask; curling his fingers beneath the hardened porcelain with ill-intent.

_These eyes spoke of murder._

Rukia swallowed her doubts as he drew it aside and revealed the hardened orbs of gold and black sclera lurking within. This was the face of a man who'd triumphed. Surpassed his limits and prevailed, losing something irreplaceable in the proccess. Ichigo stared at her and it was almost as if he were numbed; impervious to the bloodshed surrounding them. Once, she'd have praised such a mentality the willingness to cut down one's enemy being one of the necessary evil's of anyone's existence.

This went beyond that.

He was numbed, to the battle, to death, to anything and everything existing in this hollow world. Rukia felt just that, hollowed; as though someone had scooped out her soul and left her body to rot as she stood stock still, arms crossed gently over her body, hands cupping her elbows. Vibrant irises cast themselves down ever so slightly and she shifted her weight from side to side. Slowly, he turned, his body angling toward her as she looked up from the white sand and into his eyes. He didn't speak, but those insidious orbs screamed at her, demanding some sort of response.

"Ichigo," she said, softly stepping toward him. "Take that mask off your face."

He seized the mask, its teeth clamping shut harshly as it melded back into a frightening scowl below clear blue sky. Ichigo brushed a hand over his mask, his fingers whisking the ivory visage away. His brown eyes looked down at his stomach, the wound there beginning to bleed once more, ever so slightly, as his _reiatsu _began to dampen. He touched a tired finger to the fresh blood, holding his hand up and in front of his eyes.

"Rukia, I…" he began, his voice cutting off as she stood toe-to-toe with him. "I...c-couldn't...I…Inoue's..."

_"DAMN YOU!"_

His eyes widened in shock as the massive fist barreled forward at him. It was too close to dodge and with Rukia only a few meters away, it would have been suicidal. Ichigo pivoted, assumed a bracing stance, his bare feet clenched against the gravel. His dominant hand crackled outward; without the mask too weak to stop the attack, but fury flashed in his eyes all the same. All he could do was take the underhanded punch; standing in silent outrage as the wide knuckles of destructive power roared towards him.

The attack never landed.

Fingers splayed wide and grasping; as they could actually stop the onrushing espada, Ichigo offered an empty hand. Defying the expectations placed upon it, the hand clenched into a claw and caught the massive paw of a palm. Yammy was thunderstruck. Ichigo clutched at hierro, found purchase, and stopped the punch. The only sign of the erroneous impact was the slightest swirl of dust once the dust and dirt had settled into the crater his attack had left behind.

"You've gotten bigger since last time." Ichigo's smile was flint; the words gravel, nothing more than hubris. "I almost didn't recognize you." Lowering his palm; the only thing standing between them and utter annihilation, Kurosaki Ichigo cracked an unamused smile that he had no business in wearing. "Yammy." Without warning, the smoke ebbed entirely, revealing him to be between Rukia and utter annihilation was a hand, the likes of a massive knuckle pressed into his palm.

"However, this still isn't enough." His voice trickled through the smoke.

As the smoke cleared, however, her feelings of amazement quickly turned to dread. Standing in the center of a massive crater caused by Yammy's powerful attack, Ichigo stood. Though the sheer force of the Cero Espada Squad captain had utterly decimated the battlefield, this adversary was standing. _Standing!_ Incredulity surged through Kuchiki Rukia, left loose and listless as a tapered tip touched the edge of the espada's massive fingers; slung over a shoulder.

_'When did he..._

Rukia nearly broke her oath never to cry as she saw the hand, _the bare hand _of the vizard holding the enormous fist of _Yammy Riyalgo. _One shinigami and an arrancar stood in complete amazement as he casually – _lazily_ – moved the massive paw in his hand so that it no longer hovered above his head. Ichigo _held _it for another two beats, before relinquishing his grip upon the whitened knuckles, a small crack spreading across the surface of Yammy's skin before allowing the tanned appendage to fall to the earth below with a thunderous crash that nearly rent the earth asunder.

"Teme!" Yammy howled in disbelief. "That was just a fluke! It doesn't mean-

"Is that all there is to your _resurrección?"_ Ichigo tilted his head; cocked it aside, the frigid tone forcing the espada to freeze in midsentence as the lower half of a jaw_-a smile-_painted itself upon his face within the shadows. "If so, then it is meaningless. You won't be able to defeat me with me with this level of power." He reached upward with his free hand_-when had he discarded his sword-_and clasped the _crux_ of the mask. Fingers curled around the hardened ceramic,the death mask clatteing softly as the ryoka slowly draped it across his face for the second time; sheltering his visage and wresting it awayfrom the eyes of the world.

_"Kurosaki Ichigo!"_ Yammy snarled. "I'll kill you!"

"Then you'll need to be faster than that," he remarked snarkily.

_"DIE!"_

Yammy Rialgo, despite his massive size, reacted quickly and threw a second punch towards Ichigo. Whisking out existence, the vizard narrowly dodged the attack, his lithe figure scooping up Rukia and spinning away from the enormous knuckles plowing into the pillar they'd vacated. Sand snarling into his soles as he retreated; his next flying leap carrying him to the upper roof of a strange square the like of which could only be paritally seemed amongst the white static of the desert floor.

Rukia gawped after Yammy as the hulking giant receded into the distance; soon left as little more than a speck. Touching down upon one of the many pillars that dotted the barren dunes of _Las Noches' _central arena, he turned away from the hulking hollow as he stormed toward their position.

"Wait here, Rukia." Ichigo didn't wait for her answer. His uniform in tatters, he marched forward the arrancar, those evil orbs boring into the encroaching figure still several miles out. "I'm going to settle things quickly and go to the world of the living. I'm going to put an end to this whole stupid battle." Whisking the mask away from his face yet again, Rukia found herself frozen; lost in hardened pools of chesnut brown and blackened sclera.

"Ichigo...

But he was already gone, his sudden departure marking the destruction of a nearby tower, its debris falling to the desert floor below. Rukia watched the shards of stone tumble into the air, leaving the cero espada to curse his innaccuracy as Kurosaki Ichigo swept past and whispered out of existence yet again.

"Hold still, damn you!"

Yammy quickly spun his massive torso around, slamming his fist at his body, but Ichigo was already gone. His eyes shifted over to the left as he saw him reappear, dipping a hand toward his face while thar annoying reaitsu began to manifest itself for the third time; completely enveloping its host within a sinister cylinder of scarlet spiritual pressure. The hellish aura of his _bankai _began to crawl across Kurosaki Ichigo, creeping its way across the thin black daito that was his blade_, _the energy reinforcing and strengthening the katana clenched within his fist.

"What the fuck is this shit?" Yammy hollered, too amused at the Shinigami's slim katana to do anything but laugh. "You really think your little butter knife's gonna be enough to take _me _down?" Ichigo remained silent as he hoisted the katana upward, pointing it toward his arrogant adversary.

"There's only one way to find out, arrancar."

Yammy was suddenly in front of him, his enormous fist plowing through the ruby column, and its errant ocupant.

"Too slow."

Ichigo flashed out of existence for what would be the final time.

As he approached his target, Yammy swung his arm out and flung him backwards across the desert. Ichigo didn't budge. Steeling himself as the blur of brown broke through the battered barricade and flew into him; he stopped it cold by taking the impact on his shoulder and the flat of Tensa Zangetsu. Pain arched through his spine, searing through his chesnut brown irises as his body struggled with the sudden overload of agony and fought to disperse the red haze from his vision.

"You sure are noisy." Ichigo began, his words soft, silent as a stalking cat. "I'm not exactly jumping around to run away from you, you know."

As it were, Ichigo took the brunt of the blow and didn't budge an inch. His head dropped for a few moments before regaining control of itself and locking angrily upon the furming flames in the eyes that filled his vision with that of the massive mostrosity. He shook her head in self-disgust; he found it almost impossible to believe that his arm alone possessed enough strength to throw him so forcibly. A Shinigami of Rukia's level would have been crushed outright by such intense pressure.

Juxtaposed as he was to death, Ichigo hardly even felt it.

"I was leading you away." He announced, "Because I don't want to expose my friends to our spiriutal pressure."

"Bullshit!" Yammy leered down at the insect that had somehow stopped him. How does a pest like you have any strategies against that?"

Ichigo was suddenly in front of them, his thin blade pricking at Yammy's nose.

"Do I have any strategies against that?" Ichigo repeated dumbly, twin orbs of chestunut horrifically hollowfied as they locked upon Yammy Riyalgo. "I never really had any strategies against anything. I just defeated them because I had to defeat them. That's all there is to it. I don't give a rat's ass how strong you are. You may be a different level than the other Espada, but I don't give a shit. It's the same. If I have to beat you, then I'll beat you. That's all there is to it."

Yammy's response was as immediate as it was ineffective.

"YOU PIECE OF TRASH!" Yammy blasted another baala and watched it meet the same fate as its bretheren. "You cocky piece of shit! Do you think you can negate the difference in our strength with that reasoning? They're trash compared to me! Grimmjow, Nnoitra, Ulquiorra, all of them!"

Ichigo frowned.

_"That's strange. One of their comrades dies. And yet Inoue seemed more pained by his death."_

"What an odd feeling." Ichigo said aloud, quieting his outraged opponent, sweeping a hand through his ragged locks; exposing a touch of saffron within caramel colored orbs. "I didn't expect you guys to know friendship. That being said, I don't regret defeating your comrades, either."

_**"Even so...**_

Drooping, half-lidded eyes of chestnut and brown regarded the approaching espada with an air of feigned nonchalance. Sclera blackened; staining the white a hideous pitch black; swelling within those brown eyes and staining them saffron; a hideous gold as the last remnatns of humanity vanished from his face altogether.

_**"I don't like you speaking ill of those I've defeated." **_Ichigo snarled aloud. He backhanded Yammy. It was almost ridiculous. Yammy practically flew from the force of the blow. The massive espada did what anyone would do in such a situation; he sprawled in the dunes and got up slowly, his hand and many knees badly scrapped and bleeding from the impact. He made little whimpers in the cheerful afternoon sky, and Ichigo paid no heed as he _stalked_ after him and _flickered._

"What the hell was that...just now?" Yammy said, his words full of venom as he stretched his arms wide and struggled to stand. "Oi! Shinigami! Where the hell did you go, huh!" Furtively, he scanned the desert for any signs of the raging reaper, and foundonly sand, sand and more sand. "Are you scared!I thought you said I was finished! C'mon! Give me your best shot! COME ON! Piss me off and see what happens! I'll just get stronger and stronger!"

_"Is that so?"_

Something cracked across Yammy's face and sent him sprawling.

Yammy slapped into the ground hard, his massive body flipping over as he skidded onto his back. His head kissed an iron-hard pillar, made all the worse by the thickness of his hierro. Black spots swam before his eyes and left him blinded. _Up, damn you! Get up!_ Swearing and spitting he got on his hands and knees and _tried_ to stand, eyes watering, ears ringing. Pushing his tail against the gravely and granite soil, he'd made it all of halfway, a half-assed bala leaving his fist before the shadow fell upon him; before he raised his gaize and saw the ring of fire, the unamused and smoldering irises of hell itself, come to claim his life.

"M-Monster!"

Ichigo only smiled.

_**"You're finished,"**_ Ichigo repeated, and Tensa Zangetsu cracked outward; the ebony black edge ruthlessly severing the bala in half. _**"Yammy."**_ Whisking through the air, oozing red radiation from the last blast, Ichigo's wrist twisted; the small tuft of fur there somehow avoiding the flames that burst from his blade.

Rukia forced herself to suppress her gorge before she could choke on it; enrapt as she was by the next move of the her comrade. Yammy was still in the process of raising his head; dragging that large and overweighed skull across the clouds, scraping the sky as he affixed his opponent with a demeaning scowl and was left dumbstruck. Shadow and flame filled his vision, pooling around the shinigami and growing stronger with every moment as he found a hand levered before his face, less than an inch spared between those rigid digits and the espada's now upturned snarl.

**_"Getsuga Tenshou."_**

Behind the smoke and scarlet, Rukia could see Yammy's face drop as the tearing fang roared toward him. His mouth twisted down in fear and anguish as he realized that he'd gravely underestimated the power that the vizard's attack contained.

"N-no!" Yammy choked aloud, gasping and hacking as the flame filled his vision, his release shedding his skin in shame and sorrow as Ichigo's technique roared over him. "NO! You Piece of shit! Trash! Scum! You can't! You can't kill me! I'm Yammy Riyalgo! Cero Espada-

Then the opaque gale nearly blasted Rukia clear off her feet.

Rukia flew backwards, tumbling, flipping head over heels as her world vanished, the eerie afternoon sky shattering in places; ravaged by the intense stream of scalret shrinking as it turned back into a normal zanpakuto. She gripped onto the handle as the wind from the explosion propelled her ever backwards. She was able to right herself in time to avoid slamming head-first into the sand below – instead, her heels dug into the desert floor and she was forced down onto her back before the sudden sphere of crimson that swelled between the horn's of Ichigo's mask; the crux of an energy that left her dead inside at the sight of its familair snarling snap-hiss.

**_'This is...!'_**

Whatever it was, the strange sphere remained static for another second. In that instant, Rukia swore she saw Ichigo smile as he savored the expression of disbelief and terror in the eyes of its soon-to-be victim. Then the sphere blasted outward; birthing a great and tearing stream of dense reaitsu. Reaitsu so dense that it became visible almost instantly, and all but obliterated the loner amongst loners standing before its wrathful radiance.

_'Just now...that was a cero!'_

She slid backwards, her body carving a trench into the desert as Yammy Rialgo crumpled to his knees. The winds from the blast still ripped through the dunes, but Rukia forced herself to her feet. The massive Arrancar was slowly disintegrating, his body falling apart from a massive hole in his chest. The wind began to die as his dematerialization reached his legs. Ichigo hadn't budged; his unyielding black blade all that stood between him and the now impotent espada.

She shrieked and threw an arm up for her face as the fires roiled over the gargantuan hollow and boiled his body. Cruel and callous, the scarlet streams basked the pleasant afternon in an unholy and unnatural luminance, thrice shades of lights both onyx and crimson and a malevolent blackish-red filling the dome with the detonation. Ichigo maintained the beam for a moment longer, before abruptly extinguishing it within his fist.

Deprived of the energies that once maintained its velocity, what remained of the streaking bolt dissipated. Left behind, the smoldering swathe of baked mud and charred earth was all that remained of the once massibe hollow; the only other witness in the wake of its cataclysmic destruction.

Rukia gasped roughly, her body doubling over as she gripped her knees. Her lungs were on fire. She was having trouble holding her balance. She struggled to stand up straight, to watch as the last remnants of the _Cero_ Espada vanished from her sight.

As Yammy Rialgo crumbled into nothingness, Ichigo fell into the sand dunes. Her chest heaved violently as she struggled to reach him; to catch her breath. She had never seen Ichigo utlize any hollow powers before, let alone infused a Lunar Shocking Fan with the unstable energy of a cero before; had he gained control of his mask, finally?

She stared up at the sky as she dragged herself forward, her violet-colored irises gazing at the blue and white ceiling above her as she tried to calm herself down. She could see him now, the vizard, a calm and imperturpable pillar amongst the roiling black smoke that Yammy's death had left behind. He must've sensed her, because he turned; gritting his teeth as the mask whisked itself away, horns and all, in a swirl of dark reaitsu.

"Pathetic." He rumbled to himself. "He didn't even deserve that rank...

"Ichigo?" Rukia asked aloud.

"S'up?" Just like that, he was the slightly irritable exasperated youth again, raising a hand in greeting, a small smile spreading across his face as he reveled in his victory. Shouldering his blackened and battered blade, he exhaled, momentarily vanishing in a thin cloud of steam. When next she saw him, Tensa Zangetsu was gone, replaced by the overly large cleaver known soley as Zangetsu. Without so much as a sound, he slumped, falling on his back as he crumpled amongst the sands.

"Ichigo!"

Ichigo didn't answer; he was too busy trying to catch his breath. Thick beads of sweat dripped from his face as he gasped, touching at his head. A muscle jumped in his jaw as she approached, leaving Rukia to slow her pace as she watched the color leach from his face for a moment. Apparently his victory over Ulquiorra hadn't been as flawless as he'd claimed; because Ichigo wasn't moving after the second blow; in fact, he was dreadfully pale.

And then it was gone.

_"Nel."_ She heard him whispering, the color returning to his visage an instant later, his gaze sweeping to the southeast. "Holy shit!" already in the process of rising when she reached him, the impudent reaper leveled a baleful glare in her direction suddenly, though Rukia hadn't said word thus far.. Straightening and bending at the knees, he rose, sweeping Zangetsu back into its bandages, the blade somehow sticking to his back despite the lack of the chain that had once held it fast.

"I'm..._fine." _He snapped, rising seconds later, a hand clutched at his head. "I'm just...a little tired is all." Realizing he would say no more, Rukia frowned her chest gradually slowing its heaving, her heart no longer threatening to burst from her torso. He stood, a sudden anxiety filling his eyes; flaring into anger when she pushed him back down. The protest died on his lips as she planted a heel into his groin, silencing the substitute soul reaper with such vehemence that it was outright comical.

"What the hell, Rukia!" Ichigo yelped, eyes wide and furious. "Why'd you do that!"

"Fool!" She countered! "You're in no condition to be going anywhere!"

"Who're you to decide that!"

"What happened up there?" Rukia snapped baack. "Ichigo?"

He smiled beatifically at the remark.

"I won."

**WHAM!**

"OW!"

"I mean your mask, Ichigo!" Rukia was beyond herself now. "What happened to your mask!"

"You mean...**_this?"_**

Rukia froze as the death head materialized in his hand, covering his right eye. Human and hollow, the strange and matcless irises leered out at her, marred by a smile that the porcelain couldn't quite hide from the world as his lips curled with an unseen sinister intent.

"Is this what you meant, Rukia?" Ichigo's voice and the voice of another burbled outward at her as he swiped the mask away. "I don't know why its changed. Maybe its because I had to fight him again and I wasn't prepared for it?" Rukia froze at the sudden mention of the inner hollow, but Ichigo saw her concern and was quick to disperese it. "What's with the look?" He pressed. "This is just my new mask, Rukia, I defeated Ulquiorra, isn't that what matters?"

_"What?"_ Rukia felt a tiny moue of pain leave her lips. "Ichigo... you can't just-

_"I didn't."_

His gaze locked upon her, raising to the roof in a second.

"Ulquiorra isn't dead." Ichigo began slowly, his voice flat, and unamused. "Well, he was dying...but...

"As you can see, I am still very much alive." An apathetic and arrogant sigh slithered into the afternoon behind them. "Thanks to Kurosaki's woman." Rukia froze, her gaze locking upon the faded scab that marked the number where black ink and sharp, etched lines exposed the tattoo. Her gaze traveled upward, laconic green and glittering gold melding back into white and emerald as she watched the black demon reassume his sealed state upon touching down behind them.

"I-Inoue!"

Slung over his shoulder, Inoue Orihime smiled sheepishly.

"Ohayo, Kuchiki-san!"

_Four._

"She isn't my woman!" Ichigo barked, a furious tint of red filling his face, dragging Rukia from her reverie. "Don't start saying wierd things like that!" Rukia felt her gaze trickle over Ishida as he stepped of the platform, clutching his ribs ever so slighty. Ichigo's outraged shriek yanked her attention back to where their bickering had began; because the vizard was red in the face. That, and the enigmatic espada_-who appeared to be an ally_-looked to be infinitely pleased with himself.

Ulquiorra offered the slightest of smiles.

"I see." Ulquiorra scooped Inoue from his shoulder and posthumously set her down. "I will remember that."

"Why you-

"Wait a moment, Kurosaki-san." A superlifous voice stretched across the dunes before Rukia could speak. "Your wounds need to be tended." Ichigo pivoted on a heel, the protest already shaped on his lips and ready to be flung at whomever had dared to voice the objection. He froze, just as Ulquiorra turned to ice, upon recognizing the ever-and-often smiling face of Unohana Retsu, the latter striding toward them with the ever darling smile still affixed to her face.

Her gentle jade eyes locked upon Ulquiorra for a moment.

"Hello, espada." she said.

"Shinigami." The arrancar answered tartly. "I take it you have business here?"

The smile returned in full force.

"Why, yes, actually." She never wavered, even as Isane hastened to her captain's, still holding her captain's zanpakutou. "I plan on tending to Kurosaki-san's wounds and returning him to the world of the living with all due haste." She let the statement hang, unadorned between them, and Ulquiorra's right hand twitched every so slightly as he forced it to lower, to peel away from the taught grip on the handle of his zanpakutou.

"That sounds...acceptable." he assented a tlast.

"Why, thank you." Unohana replied. "Now, Kurosaki-

Ichigo wasn't having any of it.

"Look, Unohanna-san, I appreciate it, but I don't think this is the best time!" Ichigo swallowed, regretting his mistake almost immediately, trying not to meet her still smiling visage. "I don't mind being healed by you but friend of mine is...is...

"Your wounds need to be tended." Unohana repeated pleasantly. "Kurosaki-san."

Ichigo wilted almost immediately as she bid him to sit.

"Y-Yes ma'am...

**A/N: Gah! No more challenges! I hope you all liked this one, I just needed to write something warm and amusing considering the grim news I've received regarding my health. Be nice please, I wrote this for all of you solely to entertain, so I am sorry if I offended any of the fans or canon readers.**


	2. Reunion

_What can you see in their eyes?_

_In defeat, I can see their demise._

_Even though, not a blow has been struck as they have to fight._

_Like the wind, far too strong to resist._

_There is nowhere to hide._

_From the force that will tear them apart and banish their souls._

**_Chapter 2: Reunion...of a softer sort._**

Retsu Unohana was a woman of few words, and one whose medical opinion was revered and very rarely ignored. Exactly why Kurosaki Ichigo's treatment had been left to her. She'd spirited him away from his comrades, under the excuse that she could not allow medical techniques to be witnessed by any arrancar, despite the latter's newfound loyalties. Ironically Ulquiorra Schifer had been quite unusually yielding in that aspect, dismissing her claims with little more than a nod.

But her patient was being rather...

_...irritable._

Unohana's lips easily formed into a matronly smile as she tucked her hands into her sleeves, acting as though she had not had a hand in it.

"Relax your muscles, Kurosaki-san."

"But I-

_"Relax your muscles, Kurosaki-san."_

Ichigo did the exact opposite.

_**"No."**_

He tensed; it was a small, imperceptible shudder.

Chestnut brown eyes hardened, glistening into twin pools of furious saffron. Coupled with his still darkened sclera, the sight was eerie. Intoxicating. He leered at her from where he lay, spread with his back upon a thin sheet. Spread even flatter across the dunes of Hueco Muendo, the thin barrier that contained the two of them seemed to glimmer, just for a moment. Buffeted by the tricking of _reaitsu,_ Unohana Retsu pursed her lips and returned his smoldering stare tenfold.

_Strange._

The ryoka wasn't backing down.

Ordinarily, she would have pressed the matter, but suddenly, that no longer seemed wise. In fact, everything in her patient's previous pysch evaluation had just gone out the window. The ryoka held her gaze for a fraction of a second before a defiant gurggle was strangled behind her lips.

"Kurosaki-san," As always, Retsu chose her words with delicacy and care when speaking to a patient. "You still need-

_**"You said five minutes." **_He growled suddenly, accusing her. _**"And it's BEEN five minutes already."**_

For the first time in her life, Unohanna Retsu felt the cold touch of fear. It felt as though a pair of cold, clammy hands had reached through her chest and seized around her heart. Ichigo levered himself up on his elbows and those hands began to squeeze. She struggled to swallow, to speak, to breathe, but nothing came. She daren't move; her hands remaining locked just a centimeter-or-so above his chest, bathed in the kido's luminance as she struggled to reset his ribs.

"You need to wait, Kurosaki." For the first time in a decade, she let the _san_ suffix drop.

"Wait?"

The effect was as immediate as it was violent.

"I'm not waiting another godamn second!" Ichigo barked, completely unware of the partial hollowfication; triggered as it was by the sudden outburst. "Every second that I waste here is another that I could be using to put an end to all of this!" He pushed forward, a bit too fast.

"You frighten a lot of people, don't you, Kurosaki-san?"

It took the fight right out of him.

Dour expressions turned toward her in place of the fury. From his expression she could see that the topic wasn't so much taboo as it was gauche. But it was too late to take back her words. _Curious._ It had been several centuries since she'd last regretted her sharp tongue. Perhaps one century too many. She watched Ichigo in silence, the fury leaching from his features as he absorbed her words. He took them and rolled them over on his tongue for a moment, and was made mute.

"Fine." He all but spat, coming to terms with his own weakness.

"Why is this happening to me?"

Unohanna Retsu blinked, her eyes half-lidded, contemplating the question. Part of her wished that she could slow whatever was happening in Ichigo's body. As it was, he was almost recovered. After only one minute of being laid on the tarp, exposed to the healing spell, he'd started sucking up her reaitsu. At an alarming rate of speed, his body began to reclaim itself, ridding him of the many scars and improperly healed injuries he'd acquired over the course of many a month. As she watched, the bone spur in his right arm wobbled and began to shift. Almost as if something were pushing it from it within.

_Impossible._

He'd broken most of that wrist whilst blocking Yammy Riyalgo's final punch.

He shouldn't be able to move those fingers.

Unohanna had borne witness to that battle from afar_-granted she hadn't recognized the reaitsu-_and marveled at how he'd been able to hold himself together after sustaining so many injuries. Now she bore witness to something much more miraclulous. Moments ago, Kurosaki Ichigo had been on the verge of a systematic breakdown. His faltering figure sustained by sheer force of will, nothing more; his heart on the verge of collapsing from the strain demanded of himself.

No longer.

Here and now, without any sort of physical awareness, the boy simply began to heal. His arm quivered and with an audible _pop,_ reset itself in the socket. Ichigo stiffened. A long moment later, his chest rose sharply, and he coughed violently, spitting half-congealed lumps of blood out of his lungs. He lurched upright in mid-cough and clutched at his chest. His visage contorted and twisted; mouth working wordlessly against the words that refused to come, becoming a pained grimace that wasn't quite a smile but neither was it a scowl.

_"Damnit...!"_

Then the coughing passed.

Ichigo flung a hand to his face, his lips loose and parted.

"I thought I told you," He hissed aloud, burning brown solidfying for an instant he experienced a brief moment of lucidity. "This...is..._mine!"_

Within seconds his arm was restored. The skin of his back appeared to be of like mind; the flesh knitting together so quickly she could see it. In moments, it was smooth once more, unscarred. In all of her years, Unohanna Retsu had never seen such a thing. Instantaneous Regeneration. She'd suspected Kurosaki to be capable of _healing. Nothing like this! _She'd ushered him aside for the prying eyes of his enemies/allies from this very purpose, so that she might asses why his reiatsu was constantly fluctuating.

"Is there a problem, Kurosaki-san?" Despite what she'd just seen, Retsu somehow managed to keep a level head. Remarkable indeed, because Kurosaki Ichigo chose that very moment to chuckle. Soft and sinister and very much amused, laughter wracked his frame as tears_-white tears-_leaked from the corners of his eyes and spilled down his cheeks. Retsu made the mistake of comforting him. But they were much too thick to be tears; because tears were not white. Tears didn't have shape and solid substanctio

At the time, she been able to hide the shock of her discovery. Now, as she pulled a sliver of _reiryoku_ from her reserves and pushed it into the kido_-thereby strengthening the spell-_his eyes flickered open and the barrier shattered. A jagged bolt of lightning coursed across the artificial sky and split it into a thousand pieces. Thunder boomed; taking away all semblance of sound as he lurched upright and to his feet.

It was in that instant that Unohana pushed forward.

_Not gently._

Ichigo blinked, wondering at the sudden pressure on his chest. A pressure that he couldn't prevail against. He blinked again when Unohanna forced him down, her fingers strong and supple against his hardened muscles and chest. Splayed, it took little to no effort for her hands to force the war-weary warrior back onto the matt. Ichigo choked aloud, a thin sliver of blood leaking from his lips as the bandages grew tight and tautened against the sudden pressure on his torso.

"O-Oi...

Ichigo flushed.

Seven inches suddenly seemed like seven feet as she realized the compromising position into which they'd fallen.

"O-Oh my!"

Was that a blush?

"Try not to move, Kurosaki-san." Ichigo blinked, suddenly well aware of Retsu's lips, hovering mere inches from his own. "Your wounds are not fully healed, and we have not been able to increase your reiatsu at all. Every time we try to restore it, it fades away. Your companions say that you must be conscious to change that." She looked at them all. "Please, try not to strain yourselves. You are still very weak."

**"Che. We'll do what we have to,"** the hollow said sneeringly to itself.

"I said, Kurosaki-san," Unohana repeated with a smile on her face, "_please try not to strain yourselves_."

Somewhere, deep within the blackest reccesses of Ichigo's mind, his hollow shuddered.

"Well, damn...

The pale boy looked at her, wide-eyed and with shivers going down his spine, then nodded almost mechanically. Unohana turned aside while Ichigo coughed, managing to stifle the laughter bubbling up from deep within him. The explosion changed all of that. One moment, he'd been sitting there, perfectly content to wait out his treatment. The next, a dull whumo reached his ears, followed immediately thereafter by a dense pressure; the like of which he immediately recognized.

There, rising from the east, was thick cloud of sand and smoke. He tensed, every fiber of his being being put on high alert as he detected the faintest flickering of reaitsu from within the storm. There could be no denying it. No matter how much he might want to, Kurosaki Ichigo both knew and recognized this spiritual pressue and he'd be damned if he just sat around doing nothing while she was in danger.

"Nel..

With a dull thud, Kurosaki Ichigo vanished.

**0o0o0**

And arrived in the middle of a sandstorm.

Harsh grains pettled scoured his body clean; assaulting him in a neverending tide of dirt and earth. Crouched at the bast of the storm, he could just discern the smallest of shadows; lingering at the base of the massive red obelisk that was his perch. She lay there, curled into a fetal position; a ball of tattered green rags and covulsions, accompanied by the occasional whimper.

"Itsygo...She hiccuped softly. "Itsygo...it hurts...

Warily, the vizard descended.

Swathed in green rags and dirt, she skittered away when he approached. A pang of guilt stabbed at his breast. That was right. He'd left her behind. Abandoned her, left her to fend for herself, while he'd pursued Ulquiorra. But was that any reason for her to fear him so? Suddenly hesistant, he hedged half a step forward. Nel only whimpered, but she made no efforts to move herself further away from him, child that she was.

"I'm right here, Nel." His words were edged with compassion, concern. "What's wrong?"

_"It hurts."_ She whispered. "I...can't look at Itsygo...cuz..._it hurts..._

An overpowering sensation of pressure bore down upon him like an invisible hand. He sensed something enormous nearby, silent in the dark, like a giant passing within arms reach. A gravid deadly prescence too huge to grant him notice. He glanced to Neliel and saw her grimace, fingertips pressed against her temples. A droplet of blood fell from her nose.

He knew this reaitsu.

"Nel," Ichigo began, softly, slowly. "Are you-

**_"ITSYGO!"_**

The ensuing explosion flung him from his feet as though he were a child. Incredible! Scarce had he set feet upon the sand that a massive cyclone smote him across the face; pelting him with ruins and debris as he struggled to make any sort of headway. He couldn't see Nel. She'd been swept up in a cloud of sand and violet reaitsu, her screams rising to an eerie crescendo pitch.

Deep within the sandstorm, he detected the familair glint of hardened steel. By some instinct or another he had enough semblance to don his mask. Somethibng sliced right through it as though it were naught but butter. A powerful blow rocked across his jaw, sending him sprawling across the sands. Ouch. Perhaps coming here unnanounced wasn't the best approach after all, or so he mused as he watched the world invert itself before his very eyes.

Her released zanpakuto was a thin nodachi, a long blade that rivaled the size of Zangetsu. It was almost twice as long as her arm, covered in a protective sheet of metal, and strong enough to turn a building into rubble. While it made her attacks slow and easily avoidable Ichigo knew first-hand that a single strike from that sword was nearly as powerful as his own _bankai._

_Kurosaki Ichigo was stunned._

"N..Nel." Ichigo managed, thunderstruck. "Just now...what was...that...?"

He struggled to turn around, but removing his feet from where they had been planted caused him to tumble down onto his side. A searing agony flared through his chest, reminding him of the broken ribs he'd left unhealed. He looked up, shattered porcelain smattered with cheek sand as he took in the silhouette of the wonderous woman above him.

...you...lright?"

She was speaking, he knew this, but white static drowned him. Black spots speckled across his vision. Disdainful laughter slithered through his ears; piercing this crass cowl of complacency and scoffing at the vizard's feeble attempts to retain his senses.

**"Don't get too comfortable, yer majesty."**

Suddenly, Ichigo decided it imperitive that he stand.

He scraped his chin off the sand, his eyes bulging in shock when he saw that Nel Tu had become Neliel Tu Oderschvank once more. He succeeded in flopping onto his back; his wounds betraying him as his lungs heaved for air and oxygen. There was a dull thud and warm hazel filled his vision. She peered down at him in trepidation and nostalgia, gripping her knees as those dreadful shards of ceramic and porcelain pushed themselves in shattering from his visage.

He couldn't breathe.

She sat there on her knees, her knuckles whiteened around the scabbard of a zanpakutou. Her grip slackened inexplicably and she scooted forward, placing him in the sudden shade of her hair. Ichigo blinked, _blinked_ as those teal tresses created a pale curtain of viridian; sheltering him from the stabbing shards of sunlight.

"Hello, Itsygo," she lisped, her mouth curving up into a warm smile. "It's nice to see you again."

Kurosaki Ichigo swallowed, memories rushing into his mind at the sight of her. She remembered everything. He blinked, the lingering taint of hollowfication fading from his eyes; fleeing in the prescence of this gorgeous sexy creature. She smiled, her fingers uncurling, unclenching as she opened a palm and held her hand out to him. Smooth fingertips cradled his cheek. Sharpened in that instant, every one of his sense conveyed to him a myriad of emotion; shooting tendrils of fierce flaming scarlet across the entirery of his exposed expression.

He took her hand in his and smiled.

...Likewise."

**A/N: I'm back! And its not cancer! Woot! I'm going to live, so pleaaaassse review! Oh, and a small spoiler for ya'll...we get to see Grimmy as of next chappie!**


	3. Of Mice and Men

_What can you see in their eyes?_

_In defeat, I can see their demise._

_Even though, not a blow has been struck as they have to fight._

_Like the wind, far too strong to resist._

_There is nowhere to hide._

_From the force that will tear them apart and banish their souls._

**Of Mice and Men**

Neliel was nervous.

She walked next to him, her shoulder grazing against his every now and again as he continued to fill silences with the occasional comment at the ruination surrounding them, and the ever so often wince as old wounds threatened to tear open and hamper him once more. Neliel supposed she was to blame for that. She smiled back at him, astounded at how easily his voice put her at ease, and at how readily it set her on edge. He was everything she remembered and yet now he was also so much more. Ichigo's reaitsu, his very life force, had sharpened since she'd last seen him.

Frighteningly so, in fact.

It had become rough and deadly and honed to a razor's edge, much like an espada's, something that should have disturbed. And yet, it did not. Because here, with her, it was as if a great and terrible weight had been lifted from his shoulders. He was boisterous and cheery and happy as he'd never been before and her stomach flittered whenever he looked at her. Everything that had happened to them, every memory she held of her Shinigami savior, was personified here and now, in this very moment.

As she led him onward, hand in hand.

Of course, she hadn't told him the reason they were holding hands. Oh, she'd made one up of course, but still, she hadn't told him the real reason.

His every breath was like a kiss against her cheek.

And so she walked beside him, the sand cold against her feet, the blood warming her cheeks. If he was irritated by her prescence he did very little to show it. Nor did he make an effort to shy away from her. For this, the newly revived espada was grateful. Extremely so. The sheer intensity of his reaitsu had done something to her physical form. The once childlike arrancar was now no longer so, having been forced back into her adult form simply by being in the hybrid's prescence. Likewise, the scar upon her mask, and a headache that had plagued her for as long as she could remember, was no more.

Her memories had returned as well. Memories of Nnoitra. Of Tesla. Of all her days as the _Tercera_ espada, leading up to the vicious attack that usurped her position. She even remembered Ichigo. All that he had done for her; all that he had continued to do, protecting her at nearly the cost of his own life. She remembered the pain as Tesla had took out his rage and anger upon the shinigami. She remembered the tearing of her fragile little form as her reaitsu surged forth once more, transforming her into Neliel. Now, she had no such limit on her the duration of this body. Ichigo's reaitsu had sealed the rift between her two persona. For better or worse,Neliel Tu Oderschvank had returned. Now, she was accompanying her beloved savior back across the dunes of Hueco Muendo; allowing him to lead her back to the camp from which he'd so abruptly departed. She was also dimly aware of him speaking to her.

"Well, when we get back we can-

Neliel cut him off by thumbing his chin back to face her, her lips touching his softly. He hesitated for a moment, her heart sinking for a moment, before he leaned gently into her. His right hand came to rest on her thigh, his left coming up to cup her cheek and she placed both of hers on his chest and she fell forward into him. Indeed, she had many memories of Ichigo. Now, it was time to create some memories of her own.

"N-Nel!"

Neliel silenced him with a smile.

"You worry too much, Ichigo."

It was not until much, _much_ later that Ichigo remembered his abrupt departure.

* * *

_(Several hours later)_

_'I do worry too much, don't I?'_ Ichigo mused as he stared down the one that had just provoked him. Formerly his enemy, now healed by his allies. Now threatening him with the fate of his own comrades if he did not yield to his own weakness. Weakness. If he yielded to his anger, to his weakness, and fought him again, only they would his opponent, the inexhaustible Grimmjow Jaggerjack be satisfied.

_If Ichigo was weaker than him._

The sudden realization that he was even _considering_ himself to be weak brought a wave of rage to his mind with the ferocity of a great and dark tempest. Despite his wounds, Kurosaki Ichigo lurched; despite the look in those eyes, pleading for him to stop, the anger won over him and he yanked his arm out of Neliel's gentle grip. Grimmjow had all but demanded a rematch upon being healed, and now, he was dangerously close to getting what he wanted.

"Oh, so you're suddenly all touchy-feely when it comes to us _hollow?"_

Ichigo stopped and gritted his teeth.

_Nel was part hollow._

"Say that again."

A barking laugh greeted his challenge.

_"Hollow."_

Maybe it was the copious amounts of reaitsu he'd exerted within the last hour, but something about the blue-haired espada saying the word "Hollow" reminded him of Nel and her piteous expression when he'd left _-abandoned-_ her in pursuit of Ulquiorra. The more he thought of it, the more it rubbed him the wrong way. Grimmjow could bitch and moan till he was blue in the face, his lips turned the same shade as his hair, but that gave him no right to disrespect the one he was fighting so desperately to save. The very thought of it sent a shiver down his spine. What if she was dying? Would he be the one to blame if that were to happen? Just the thought of it; that she might be dying ou there, here, now, while he wasted his breath on a former enemy...

_...he couldn't take it._

Ichigo stood, woddenly not taking enough care. Wobbly on his feet, he glared across the dune at the one who had spoken. That shit-eating grin adjouring the arrancar's features in the much the same manner as it had during their last battle, grew even wider at the expression it found.

"Huh?" The sexta espada picked at his ear with a finger, feigning nonchalnace. "Did I strike a nerve?"

"I don't care if I become a hollow." Kurosaki began flatly. "I don't care if I'm stuck as a shinigami, either." With every word and syllable, his voice changed as though he were trying to choke down more than a gallon of water and speak at the same time. No, wait, that wasn't right. It felt like she were looking into the eye of a storm. And Kurosaki-kun was the one shouting into it. _Something was wrong with his reaitsu again._ Inoue looked on and was lost; baffled by the sudden surge of reiryoku that came crashind down amongst them. Kurosaki-kun spoke once more and his voice was muffled, as if he were speaking through a filter; breathing beneath the sea, and dragged to his doom by an iron anchor.

_"Am I not human?"_

Metallic in this tone, sibilant in this silence, he snarled one final phrase.

_**"I DON'T FUCKING CARE ANYMORE!"**_

Ichigo touched a finger to his forehead, his eyes drooping shut for all of an instant. When they opened again, black obsidian and saffron gold narrowed the distance between them; the venemous hiss all but exploding from behind the demonic shield as it manifested before his face mirrored by a crazed but nonetheless dangerous snarl. The espada's lips were still flapping, but it was apparent that he and the shinigami surrounding him had noticed that the hybrid had turned and was glaring at them.

In that instant a low hiss exploded between them.

"Huh?"

Ulquiorra observed the sudden spike in spiritual pressure and frowned.

"Grimmjow." He began slowly. "I wouldn't anger him at the moment." Melancholic jade met smoldering sapphire as the two espada exchanged a glance; one leering superiorly at the man who'd nearly killed him hours before, the other, warily regarding the sudden change in the man who was not a man at all.

Because Kurosaki Ichigo was something more than a visored.

He looked the espada directly in the eye and released a dense wave of _reiatsu._

The arrrancar's mouth hung open in shock as he and those surrounding him fell to their knees. His eyes were staring straight into Ichigo's, the expression on his face a mixture of fear, fury, confusion and defeated dejection. His jaw started working but he couldn't force any sound to come out.

_"What the fuck was that?" _Ichigo repeated, his shihakusho smoldering out behind him in a plume of jet-black reiatsu.

That old insult that Grimmjow had shot his way seemed to snap something inside him, his pent-up pessimissim swelling like a riverbed after the breaking of a dam. With a feral snarl, Ichigo launched himself forward and swung his blade down into his opponent's, causing the Arrancar's eyes to widen under a shower of sparks.

"Who are _you_ callin' _weak?" _Ichigo hissed through gritted teeth, forcing his foe down through the air, "You no good piece of shit!" He thrust a foot forward, slamming a kick into Grimmjow's chest and sending the Arrancar plummeting into the earth below. The Shinigami quickly shot downwards, almost immediately closing the gap between the fallen Espada and himself.

"_Getsuga_," Ichigo called as he hovered above the crater in which the _Sexta_ espada was buried, "_Tenshou!"_

**_A/N: Lo and behold! Am I not Human returns to the fray as well, my friends! Hope you liked the IchixNel moment as much as I did writing it! Oh, and now poor Grimmy's gone and pissed off the wrong vizard. I wonder how this will turn out? I apologize for the short chappy! Now, onto updating my other stories! Also, as a rare treat, a preview of next chapter as promised!_**

**_R&R! =D_**

**_(Preview) No mas Ricochet_**

"HIYORI!"

The air shattered behind him.

Hirako Shinji choked; it was a raw, disbelieving gasp. Because the air had been sundered, the atmosphere bending inward at the corners; spreading a thin black line parallel. Exposed, a mask made of death itself tore through the afternoon sky as it emerged from another dimension. Tearing itself free with a sibilant hiss, the _garganta_ yawned behind its owner, revealing a roiling expanse of blackness lurking just beyond their sight as it stretched across the horizon.

There was someone...no..._something_ in there.

Its lone occupant hadn't lingered, he'd already departed the swilrling void by the time Hirako Shinji recognized him. _Impossible._ That slim black daito, jagged reaitsu, and coat shihakusho identified him almost immediately, but that mask, had it always looked like that? Locked upon the hideous facade of horned plaster and porcelain, Shinji sought the man behind the mask; the smoldering saffron orbs that were surtely be at the helm of such power, and found only hardened ceramic over the slits where the eyes might have been.

"Son of a bitch." Shinji whistled softly to himself as he beheld the sight.

Hiyori wriggled into his grip; her body nestled into the crook of an arm, her head pressed into a chst that bore a deep slash across the torso. Her mouth moved but nothing came, the retort ashen and barren upon her tongue; leaving her to taste blood as she bit down to supress her shock. Transfixed by the thin stream of blood that seeped across the shihakusho of her saviour, turning black to red and auburn to crimson, she felt the tears coming, coming much too fast. Diminutive against such a sight, knowing that she'd stared death in the face yet again, only to be wrested away from that great abyss by the very one wo'd once threatened to kill her himself, she gapwed at the _bloodied_ fabric of his shihakusho.

"Damn you."

Tears welled in her eyes, large swelling globes of wide-eyed moisture that she'd never shed, not even during their exile. A wellspring of emotion swirled behind those frantic orbs of chestnut brown;_ fear confusion disbelief desire relief,_ and a raw, keening sound as her fist began to feebly fist

And all the while, her saviour remained steadfast.

"It looks like I made in time," A blackened and unamused voice burbled out from behind the porcelain. "What the hell were you thinking just now?" His gold and black eyes were still burning on the opponent ahead of him as Kurosaki Ichigo stalked through the smoke and brought his bankai to bear.

Ichimaru Gin frowned, a small look of distress crossing his face as he found why _Shinsou_ refused to retract. Spattered by blood, the tapered tip had indeed found flesh, but instead of piercing through supple skin and bone, it quivered fruitlessly as hardened fingers of unyielding _hierro_ clamped down upon its trembling tip. Caught by the bare hand of Kurosaki Ichigo, all that stood between Hiyori Sarugaki and bifurcation.

A small look of distress crossed Gin's face as the madman in front of him thrust his sword forward, the tip pointing directly at him from across the room. Black flames licked at the tapered tip, sparking in suppressed fury as the seconds ticked by.

locked murderously upon one Gin Ichimaru, the latter's ever-present smile dimpling in slight distress as he found his blade

_"Getsuga..._

Wrapped in a thick swathe of of shadow and flame; sheathed within the divine destruction that was an unreleased _Getsuga, _the blade descended upon Aizen and claimed his head. Surely that must've been his fate, because the moment Kurosaki Ichigo struck, he lost all sight of them both.

_**"TENSHOU!"**_

A massive crescent of black and blue and crimson swung in from his left, like a burning wrecking ball, and _slammed_ into Sosuke Aizen's unprotected flank. Shinji tripped back into the stream smoke as vizard and shinigami alike vanished inside the roiling blaze, the miniature sun flying onward and into the cityscape below. He stood and watched as the ball of fire exploded over the world, drenching the surrounding rubble in its flames, before a sharp punch of sound caused his heart to lurch upward and out of his chest. Tugging his cap back into place he turned and greeted their arrival with the exuberant grin for which he'd become so infamous during his captaincy, the relief and joy at the appearance of an old ally nearly overwhelming him for a moment.

_Damn but the kid was quick._

Kurosaki Ichigo landed next to Hiyori, the young ryoka's black _bankai _already released. He peered out from the narrow eye slits that stretched across his white mask, his gold irises scanning the infernal forest of flame for any sign of movement. He said nothing as she swallowed, as he lifted a hand up to the right side of his face, tracing the features of his mask with a finger. With a subtle shudder, the mask wavered as he placed the palm upon it. With a swift movement, the white bone moved like milk as it molded itself against his palm and vanished with the wind.

"That wasn't very smart." He glanced at Hiyori quickly, expressionlessly, before returning his gaze flameward. "Idiot."

"Ichigo," Shinji said, relief and exhaustion evident in his voice. "got you to come?"

"Not like I had a choice," Ichigo shot back curtly, his eyes still intent on the forest.

"You still haven't told them?" It wasn't really a question.

"Nope. And while we're here, I don't want any of these assholes making it back to tell him for me."

She looked at Neliel again, her eyes relaxing enough to betray a small sliver of happiness. Despite being close allies, they hadn't seen each other in almost three years. After they'd begun their planning with the Vizards, Neliel couldn't risk being discovered and Lilynette had to take her place in the Espada. All communication between them had been through Harribel and, recently, Ulquiorra and Grimmjow.

Shinji couldn't help but smile at him now. He looked older.

"You take care of Fuura, okay?" Lilynette said. "I'm gonna get back and make sure Shuuhei finishes off Szayel…"

Rather it would have,

She trailed off, her eyes tightening as she looked at the forest. Neliel spun around and immediately saw what had grabbed her friend's attention: the fires in the forest were going out, quickly. They were lessening from a single point, as though there was a hole dragging all of the flames into it.

They were gone.

The rain had stopped falling heavily enough to extinguish the inferno that Lilynette had created; there shouldn't have been any reason for it to suddenly vanish like that. Neliel tightened her grip on her sword as her eyes watched for any sign of life.

A buzz of _sonído _sounded next to her. She turned to see Wonderweiss Margera's _resurreción _towering above her, his shadow falling over Lilynette as he moaned softly at her. His long arm quickly shot out, slapping the smaller Arrancar away like a gnat, her tiny body tumbling and skipping down the ravine like a pebble on a pond. With another buzz, Wonderweiss followed her.

"Lilynette!" Neliel cried, holding her zanpakuto out in front of her chest, her bloodied palm touching its back as she sprinted.

"Declare, _Gamuza!"_

_"Hold your breath!"_

Ichigo bit down on his retort and complied.

"Collapse!" Shinji bellowed, thrusting his katana toward the soil below, a baleful blue glow aready eclipsing the base of its hilt. "Sakanade!"

**A/N: I'm back! And its not cancer! Woot! I'm going to live, so pleaaaassse review! Oh, and a small spoiler for ya'll...we get to see Grimmy as of next chappie!**


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